Fifa renews with EBU for Women's World Cup and age-grade tournaments

Soccer - 08 Nov 2018

Author: Jonathan Rest

The European Broadcasting Union, the umbrella body of mainly public-service broadcasters, today extended its long-running contract with Fifa covering the 2019 Women's World Cup and various of age-grade competitions over the next four years.

The agreement covers 38 territories and includes 13 Fifa tournaments between 2019 and 2022.

The package of rights is headlined by the 2019 Women's World Cup in France, and also includes U-17 and U-20 World Cups and the U-17 and U-20 Women’s World Cups, plus beach soccer and futsal competitions.

The EBU has held the contract since 2007, and the renewal complements the existing EBU-Fifa agreement for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

Pascal Fratellia, head of football rights at the EBU, said: "As a continuation of our existing long-term partnership with Fifa, we are very pleased that we have been able to reach – on behalf of our members – another agreement until 2022 for these exciting football competitions.

"This deal provides Fifa with a strong and reliable free-to-air broadcast commitment from EBU members and reinforces our ambition and dedication to showcase national team football events."

Once again, countries not part of the rights contract include France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Nordic territories, Russia and the UK.

Earlier this week, Fifa opened an invitation to tender for rights in Italy to the 2019 Women's World Cup, and rights to age-grade tournaments in Italy, France and across Scandinavia.

Rights to the 2019 Fifa Women's World Cup have already been sold in France to TF1, the commercial free-to-air broadcaster, which has sub-licensed rights to all 52 games to pay-TV's Canal Plus.

TF1 has retained free-to-air rights to the 'best 25 matches' from the competition, including all of France’s games. TV4, the commercial broadcaster in Sweden, and Danish Broadcasting Corporation, the public-service broadcaster in Denmark, will also show the tournament.